


Shake It

by checkthemargins



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Drabbles, M/M, all genres
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-09
Updated: 2013-07-07
Packaged: 2017-12-04 17:23:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 6,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/713179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/checkthemargins/pseuds/checkthemargins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>unrelated Nick/Louis drabbles that were mostly based on little prompts</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer:** I do not own this band, or the people in it, or anything at all having to do with it. This is just for kicks. No harm intended.

Nick has absolutely no interest in professional football, and certainly none in Louis’s shitty school team, but if nothing else it’s nice to watch Louis get all sweaty and every once in awhile he wipes his forehead with the hem of his shirt and Nick gets a glimpse of that body-molding spandex stuff that he wears underneath his kit. 

“Shit,” says Harry, “that was a good save.” 

Louis’s burying his face in his hands in aggravation, his shot the one that missed, which is probably disappointing but they’re winning anyway and his arse looks _amazing_.

“Mm,” Nick says.

Harry jabs him in the side with his elbow. “You don’t even know what’s going on, do you?”

“Louis just missed,” says Nick, and points.

Harry rolls his eyes.

At the end of the game, they trudge over to wait outside the locker room. Louis comes out grinning—they won, and he made up for the goal he missed right at the end—but when he sees Nick he lights up like the bloody sun. Nick’s just able to keep the grin that spreads across his face strictly in the smirk zone, but he laughs when Louis drops his bag and launches himself into his arms.

“You said you weren’t going to come!” 

“First game of the year,” says Nick. “Had to be here, didn’t I?”

“And only three and a half months until you’re legal, Lou!” Harry adds helpfully.

Louis flips him off, but his face is buried in Nick’s neck and he’s warm and freshly-showered and small and pretty and it’s been _weeks_ since Nick, away at university, has seen him. Not that he’s been pining, or anything.

“I missed you,” Louis murmurs, and bites at his neck like that’ll make it less soppy. Nick rolls his eyes but squeezes him closer and ignores Harry’s big moon cow eyes on them. All right, maybe he’s been pining a little.

“Missed you too, doll.”


	2. Chapter 2

It’s not like Nick goes online looking for pictures of One Direction, or anything. But when they’re in his email from his friends in the know, or when the band is on his bleeding television in HD while he’s sat in his living room with his mates it’s not like he’s going to look away. 

“Oh, _sweetheart_ ,” Aimee says, looking at the screen where the lads are interviewing. Every single one of them looks absolutely exhausted, but Nick’s only dating one of them, so he singles in on that one. Louis looks dreadful. Stunning, of course, as he always is, but his eyes are red and a bit glazed and his shoulders are slumped and he’s smiling, nodding along with something Harry—who is barely able to string two words together himself—is saying, but he’s paler than Nick’s ever seen him. He winces, that deep pit inside him that’s full of all these _feelings_ about Louis fucking Tomlinson throbbing a bit. Aimee looks around at Nick, smacking him on the shoulder like it’s his fault or something. “Grimmy, look at him!”

“I see ‘im,” Nick tells her, shifting a bit closer to Henry, who is less drunk and showing no signs of smacking him around. Aimee frowns at him. He quirks an eyebrow at her. “What d’you want me to do about it? He’s not home.”

“They all look about to fall over,” Pixie says. She’s lying on the floor, one leg bent and the other resting on her knee, foot kicking idly in the air. “Lou just looks like he’s about to cry from it.”

Henry frowns thoughtfully. “Is Louis a big crier?”

“No,” Nick answers, honest for once. He’s only ever seen Louis actually cry once in the year and a half they’ve been together, and it still ranks among the top five worst moments of Nick’s life. “Definitely not. He’s more of a joke about it and shove it down into the dark recesses of his soul type.”

“That’s convenient,” Alexa says from Aimee’s other side on the sofa, leaning around her to smirk at him. “I’d pay good money to see you try and comfort anyone, let alone Lou.”

“Oi! I’m very comforting.”

“I can just see it,” says Henry. “Lou crying—prettily, of course—and Grimmy here patting him on the head and looking up the latest pap shots of Harry Styles on his computer at the same time.”

“Fuck the lot of you,” Nick says. They’re laughing at him, now. “I’m like, the best boyfriend ever.”

“You forgot his _birthday_ last year,” Pixie points out needlessly.

“That doesn’t count! Extenuating circumstances! I’m good at everything else. I buy his favorite biscuits and I answer his texts in a timely manner and I let him have a hook in the shower.”

“Congratulations on being a decent human being, mate,” says Henry.

Nick glares at the TV, because he can’t glare at all of them at once. The interview is wrapping up. All five of the lads are waving at the camera. Louis’s resting an elbow on Liam’s shoulder, like he’s too tired to hold his arm up.

“You’d best be nice to him when he gets back,” Aimee says. 

Nick sighs, exasperated. “You know I do actually _like_ him, right? I’m not just in this to say I fucked Louis Tomlinson. I care quite a lot about him. I’m not going to just watch him fall on the floor when he gets home.” 

“Mm,” says Aimee.

“He’s fine,” says Nick. “Really.”

It’s not entirely true. Nick knows for a fact thanks to his trusted spy (double-oh-Harry Styles) that Louis’s running on three hours of sleep in the last six days, but Louis’s trying so bloody hard to act as though he’s all right that Nick feels it would be bad form to give it away.

“Just give him our love when he gets home and make sure he eats something,” says Pixie. He rolls his eyes so hard it hurts, clicks the TV to a music video station, and lets the subject drop. . It’s really quite annoying that Nick’s friends like Louis better than they like him.

 

 

“You look like utter shit,” Nick says by way of greeting later that night when Louis calls. There’s a sort of horrified laugh from Louis, and even that sounds rough.

“You’ve got this thing about kicking me while I’m down,” Louis drawls.

“Just being honest, darling.”

“You’re such a prick,” says Louis, and then he yawns. Nick’s stirring rice in a pot at his stove. It’s almost two in the morning, but it’s Friday so he doesn’t have to be up in the morning and he’s hungry. For rice, apparently. He forgot how bloody long it takes to make.

“You knew that when we started fucking. I seem to remember it being one of my selling points.”

“I said you _are_ a prick, Nicholas, I didn’t mention anything about your actual prick.”

“Go on, then,” says Nick, smiling into the phone. “Tell me how big I am. Go on. And say the word ‘cock’. I love it when you say ‘cock’.”

“You’re being a ginormous _cock_ , Grimshaw, which sometimes goes along _with_ your ginormous cock.”

Nick makes a pleased sound and Louis laughs. The sound of it makes tension that Nick didn’t know he was carrying ease out of his shoulders. He sighs quietly. “Miss you, kid.”

“Fuck,” Louis says with another little laugh, and his voice drops and he sounds just wrecked, exhausted. “I miss you too. Can’t fuckin’….”

“What?”

Louis sighs. Nick can just imagine him rolling his eyes at himself. “I can’t sleep right without you, y’know? I’m just. Whatever. We’re taking a red eye Sunday…should be home like, six in the morning Monday.”

“Lou,” Nick says, unbearably fond.

“Shut up.”

“ _Lou_.” 

“God, I fucking hate you, you’re awful and you’re _so mean to me_ and you make me ridiculous and—” 

Nick cuts him off, smiling so hard his face hurts from it. “I’ve already booked Monday off work. I’ll be here when you get home.”

Louis’s quiet for a moment, and then he says, “Yeah?”

Nick presses his fingertips to his lips, shakes his head at himself. God, this bloody kid. “Yeah.”


	3. Chapter 3

Nick doesn’t speak the whole way home, far too busy gnawing on his tongue and being silently irate. Louis’s humming annoyingly next to him, just a little drunk. He rolls his head along the back seat of the cab to look up at Nick, pink-cheeked and pretty, a sweet smile on his face and his eyes heavy and like, alluring. Nick frowns darkly and looks away, rolls his eyes when Louis starts to sing outrageously off key along with the radio, some 80s hairband song that he clearly doesn’t know the lyrics to.

By the time they’ve pulled up in front of Nick’s house, it’s a pleasure to shove Louis out of the car, ignoring his drunken giggles as he finds his footing. He sighs heavily and pays the driver, watches him go before looking around at Louis, who’s swaying a bit, looking up into the sprinkling rain with a dazed, stupid grin on his face and his eyes squeezed shut.

“Mind if we go in the fucking house, now, Tomlinson?”

Louis opens his eyes, tilts his head curiously and follows when Nick turns to trudge up the walk to the door. “Tomlinson? You haven’t pulled that one out since The Great Schism of twenty-twelve.”

“Sorry, _darling_ ,” says Nick, “My lovely little cub, light of my—”

“Are you actually mad?” Louis asks, sounding curious more than anything, as Nick lets them inside. He flips the lights on and Louis toes out of his shoes, leaves them right in the fucking doorway. Nick takes a deep breath and very carefully nudges them toward the wall with his foot before untying his Chuck Taylor’s and setting them neatly next to Louis’s Tom’s.

“Whatever gave you that idea?”

Louis’s standing in the middle of the living room, stretching, his t-shirt pulling up to reveal a strip of skin and Nick’s mind flashes back to the party, the club, to the big muscly chav that was looking at Louis like a rare bloody steak and following him around all night, laughing at all Louis’s stupid jokes, touching his shoulder and back and side like he had any right. He snaps out of it when Louis gives him an unimpressed look.

“Did someone piss in your martini, love?”

Nick rolls his eyes and stalks off toward the bedroom, entirely too tired for this. “There’re blankets in the hall closet. Enjoy your night on the sofa.”

He mostly just says it because he knows it’ll get a reaction, which it does. Louis makes a loud, indignant sound and stomps after Nick. “Are you fucking kidding me? What the hell is wrong with you?”

He’s flushed and so fucking hot in his paper thin white t-shirt that’s so low in the neckline and trousers tight enough that they may as well have been painted on and Nick wants to fuck him up, wants to pull his hair and pin him down and bruise his hips and wrists and mark his neck up and make Louis scream his name. 

“You don’t have to stay here,” he shoots back casually, as though unaffected. He’s stripping his shirt off, and then tugs the under shirt up over his head, sits down on the foot of the bed to peel his socks off. “You can go back to the party, find that big beefy groupie of yours.”

Louis stares at him, arms crossed over his chest, eyes narrowed. “You’re being a dick because you’re _jealous_?”

“He was practically _fucking_ you!” Nick argues. “That wasn’t dancing, love, that was sex with your clothes on.”

“Oh fuck you! What the hell do you think you were doing grinding with Pix and Henry, then?!”

“It was Henry and Pix! Not some Neanderthal on steroids trying to—”

“To what?” Louis asks, and his voice is flat and even but he’s walking closer to where Nick’s sitting, and Nick damns himself when he spreads his knees so Louis can fit between them. Louis’s little hand fists in Nick’s hair and tugs until Nick’s looking up at him, and Nick curls his hands around Louis’s hips despite himself, digs his thumbs into the hollows just inside the bone hard, hard enough to make Louis hiss, to make his hips shudder forward a bit. Louis looks down at him, lets go of Nick’s hair to cup the side of his neck, thumbing the dip of Nick’s throat. “To what, Nick?”

“Fuck off,” Nick says weakly, furious and absolutely unable to move away because he’s so fucking addicted to this, to Louis’s scent and his touch and his skin and the sounds he makes and everything about him.

“To take me from you?”

Nick bites his tongue hard, looks away. His fingers dig into Louis’s bum and he drags his thumbs back up over his hipbones to shove up under his t-shirt. He doesn’t say anything, and Louis sighs, quiet, anger gone and that just makes Nick even angrier, but before he can do more than open his mouth to yell Louis’s hunching over to kiss him, and it’s thorough and hungry and hot. Nick growls into Louis’s mouth and hauls his little body into his lap, palms roughly at the small of his back and thick of his thigh and bites sharply at Louis’s bottom lip, swallows the hot sound Louis makes.

They kiss until they’re breathless, Louis shoved right up close, their chests together, Louis panting against Nick’s neck and his fingers back in Nick’s hair. Nick presses his forehead to Louis’s throat, rubs his hand up and down the length of his spine. When Louis speaks, his voice is low, lips at Nick’s ear.

“You know I’m yours, you pretentious jealous twat. Because I want to be, not because you want me to be. A decision _I_ made and I’m not gonna fucking change my mind so maybe _remember that_ the next time you want to pick a fight over bullshit.”

Nick doesn’t say anything, but the kiss he presses to Louis’s throat is tender, the closest he’s going to get to an apology, and Louis sighs, no doubt rolling his eyes, and loops his arms around Nick’s shoulders and squeezes. Nick hugs him back, tongues once at the hinge of Louis’s jaw and just breathes him in. Says, “Wanna fuck you.”

Louis laughs, quiet, rough, says, “Yeah”, and Nick thinks _mine_.


	4. Chapter 4

Louis’s sprawled on the bed in boxer-briefs and a t-shirt, reading a magazine, hair in a soft fringe and glasses on his face. He grins when he sees Nick. Nick toes off his shoes and crawls onto the foot of the bed, nudging at Louis’s bare legs until he spreads them and Nick can collapse between them, resting his cheek on Louis’s tummy. He sighs very deeply, and tries not to make any involuntary happy noises when Louis starts to stroke his hair.

“N’aw, Nicholas. What’re you complaining about today?”

Nick growls and turns his head to bite at Louis’s wrist. Louis lets him, and when Nick peers up at him he’s watching Nick curiously with an eyebrow raised. Nick sighs and flops his hand onto the mattress. “Oh, nothing,” he says woefully.

Louis is probably rolling his eyes, so Nick pinches his thigh, just in case. Louis’s a bit of a masochist though, so it doesn’t bother him, just makes him spread his legs a bit wider. His crotch is kind of tucked against Nick’s collarbone. Nick picks his head up and shoots Louis a charming smile. “Just missed you is all, love.”

Louis snorts, and Nick hides a grin against Louis’s shirt. Louis’s middle is small and soft and so warm. Nick turns his face into it, shifts around so he can get his fingers up under Louis’s t-shirt and push it up, until there’s just warm skin and the soft of Louis’s belly to nuzzle again. Louis makes this quiet little sound, content, like a cat, and tightens his grip in Nick’s hair just a bit. Nick grazes his teeth along the rim of Louis’s bellybutton and Louis’s legs open a bit more, knees turning outward until he’s all spread out. Nick tickles at his inner thighs and presses a series of hot, open-mouthed kisses to Louis’s belly until he can feel Louis’s dick starting to stiffen up against his chest.

“Nick,” says Louis, voice a bit breathy. He tugs on Nick’s hair and Nick kisses his way up Louis’s torso, pushing the t-shirt up as he goes, until he can whorl his tongue around one stiff nipple and wedge his hands between Louis and the mattress, cupping his lovely arse and squeezing, guiding him up to grind a bit against Nick’s abdomen. Louis’s like, the most passionately filthy cockslut Nick’s ever met. It takes almost nothing to get him hard and hungry for it, and he’s all— _all_ —Nick’s. Nick sucks on his nipples until Louis is swearing, hiccupping and hissing from how tender they are, his little hands curled into Nick’s shoulders, fingernails pressing in hard through Nick’s shirt. Sometimes, Nick likes to call Louis ‘kitten’, and Louis will purr and hiss for him, nuzzle up against him and arch his back when Nick strokes him, go all pliant and be so _good_ for Nick, mewling into the pillows and coming only when he’s told he can, obeying orders like a good pet.


	5. Chapter 5

Louis had his wisdom teeth out yesterday, and Nick was a good proper boyfriend and fed him milkshakes and gave him pain medication and stroked his hair and didn’t laugh too much at his swollen chipmunk cheeks. But he still looked so pitiful this morning and sad at the thought of Nick leaving him to suffer alone that Nick caved and brought him into the station with him. The worst part about it is that it’s not as though he didn’t know that’s what Louis was aiming for with his big round wet eyes and very carefully heart-wrenching frown. Even when he _knows he’s being manipulated_ he still ends up with Louis next to him in the cab, rifling through the pockets of Nick’s jacket and talking a mile a minute in a slurred voice because his cheeks are still swollen and he’s on codeine.

Now, he’s rolling around on the floor around Nick’s desk. Nick’s on air in five minutes. Fiona is sitting on the floor cooing at Louis a bit like he’s some sort of pet, sharing her banana with him.

“What’s happened to him?” Finchy asks curiously. “Doesn’t he have lectures today?”

Louis moans mournfully and flops onto his stomach, batting at Nick’s ankles.

“He’s had his wisdom teeth out.”

“Oh,” says Finchy.

Louis is singing, but Nick can’t quite tell what song it is. It mostly sounds like a lot of humming interspersed with the word’ baby’. Nick tries not to look down at him too fondly when Louis rolls onto his back, directly underfoot now, and beams dopily up at him.

“Heeey, babe.”

Nick huffs a laugh. “Hi, love.”

“Do you want to have a nap, Louis?” Fiona asks him, standing up and tossing her banana peel into the bin. “Live lounge is empty.”

“ _No_ ,” says Louis. He sits up. His hair is squashed under a grey beanie, fringe soft-looking on his forehead. His little swollen cheeks are _precious_. Nick reaches down to swipe his thumb over the curve of one high cheekbone and Louis turns his head to press his smile against Nick’s palm.


	6. Chapter 6

Louis’s asleep, sprawled on his back, loose-limbed and very pretty, his chest rising and falling with his deep and even breaths. The blankets are around his hips and he lovely little belly is exposed and he’s got one arm across his hips and the other stretched up so his hand’s pushed under his pillow. His eyelashes are ashy smudges on his cheeks and he looks like an absolute angel. He’s the picture of peace.

Nick prods him sharply in the side, and he comes awake with a little yelp, flailing a bit like he’s waving off an attacker, halfway to sitting up before his eyes land on Nick and he kind of freezes, perched weirdly with one hand bracing himself on the bed next to his bum, one of his knees drawn up a bit. He’s wide-eyed, hair an absolute wreck. He blinks, looks around very slowly at the digital clock on the nightstand, and then turns back to Nick with a murderous glare and hisses, _“what the fuck is wrong with you?”_

Nick smiles up at him innocently, turned onto his side and stretched comfortably. “lo,” he says.

Louis stares at him for so long that Nick starts to feel a bit uncomfortable, so he clears his throat, which helps. It’s still another few seconds before Louis seems to find his voice. “Nicholas. Please. please tell me that you didn’t wake me up at three o’clock in the morning to say hello.”

“There was a bug,” says Nick, quite smoothly. “It was on you. I was doing you a favor, love.”

“You are so fucking full of shit,” Louis says.

“Was huge. Size of my fist. Nearly died, me. You’re lucky I like you so well.”

Louis snorts. “You don’t like me at all, you’re just like, unwillingly in love with me.”

“Yes, well, whatever the case, your death would mean both work and sadness for me, so I rescued you.”

“Mm,” says Louis, but his eyes are narrowed now and this time not in anger but speculation. Nick looks away, importantly, scans the ceiling and the wall past Louis, the light from the street lamp outside splashing through the gap in the drapes over the window. After a few long moments, Louis sighs in a put-upon way and shoves at Nick’s shoulder until Nick turns on his back, and then lies back down and wraps around Nick like an octopus, and Nick pretends he’s not trembling a little bit when he slides his palm down Louis’s bare back. Louis huffs a soft breath into his neck. “You know you can just wake me up nicely and be like ‘Lou, I had a nightmare, let’s have a cuddle’, right?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” says Nick loftily, digging his fingers into one of the dimples just above Louis’s lovely arse. “There was a giant, mutant, football-sized bug about to eat you.” 

“I thought you said it was the size of your fist.”

“It was _at first_.”

He can feel Louis smile against his skin, and he bites his lip on his own grin when Louis presses a quiet kiss right there on his neck. “Love you, y’know?” Louis murmurs, already mostly asleep again.

“Whatever,” says Nick. “Go to sleep.”

Louis snorts, nuzzles further into Nick’s neck like he’s trying to crawl inside him and hums contentedly. “Got you.”

“Whatever,” Nick repeats, this time in a whisper, ‘cause Louis’s asleep again and well, hell, Nick figures he may as well be too.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick works in the admissions office at a university. Louis's the new intern.

The person manning the security gate at the car park at the university changes on a quarterly rotation. Nick gets on very well with three of them. The fourth—James—is a raving bigot and also Nick's next door neighbor. He's built like a brick house and possibly ex-military, judging by the way he holds himself and the severe haircut he sports. He has big dark eyes and a rather attractive face, but his expression is always grumpy and stiff whenever he has to talk to Nick. In response, Nick tries to act as gay as he possibly can in his presence. It's the first day of the Summer term, and unseasonably warm outside for London. Nick's wearing cut-off shorts and a pink tie-dye Grateful Dead vest that hangs loose around him. As he pulls up to the booth where James is sitting, he puts on his most beatific smile.

"Good morning, James!"

"Mmph," says James.

Nick hands over his parking card for validation. "It's been ages! How's the family?"

"Fine," James says, very stiffly. He looks like someone holding a handful of dog shit under his nose. Nick puts his elbow on the door where the windows rolled down and props his chin in his hand.

"I saw the missus at Sainsbury's on Saturday, and the kids," he tells James. James's wife isn't any less of a bigot, but where James's approach is to ignore and make snide remarks and attempt to protect his children from witnessing Nick and his general being, his wife takes a far more and no-less offensive sympathetic approach. Nick imagines that after he said hello to them at the grocery, she led her children in a prayer circle for him.

"Here," says James, thrusting Nick's parking card back into his hand once he's scanned it.

"Thanks ever so!" Nick says, dropping it into its usual spot in the center consol. "Have a wonderful day!"

James grunts, and Nick drives into the covered car park. He churns up the volume so that Beyonce plays loud enough for the entire parking structure to rumble. He parks in his usual spot, pulls his dry cleaning from the back seat, and wanders out of the car park and onto campus, whistling.

The admissions office where he works is at the front and center of campus. He greets Fiona, already on the phone at the front desk, with a kiss on the head. She smacks him on the arse and pulls the phone away from her face, covering the mouth piece. "Fresh blood," she tells him, wiggling her eyebrows. "You'll love him."

Nick perks up, opens his mouth to start asking questions but she holds her hand up imperiously and goes back to her phone conversation. Nick walks past her, pushing open the door to the offices. Matt, Ian and LMC are all standing together, whispering like gossiping schoolgirls, huddled in front of Matt's desk. Nick raises an eyebrow at them, and then follows their line of sight across the room to his own desk.

There's a boy on top. He's small and has a truly spectacular bum, which is all Nick can see for a moment as the boy is on his hands and knees on the surface of the desk, bent over the front so he can rifle through Nick's things in the drawers. Nick is so shocked and so offended at the same time that it takes him a few moments to make himself react. He looks back around at Matt, LMC and Ian. LMC is laughing into her hand, and Matt shrugs, looking just as helplessly confused as Nick feels.

Nick resituates his dry cleaning behind his back, fingers hooked into the hook of the hanger at his shoulder, and approaches his desk warily. The boy's arse is round and plump and stretching the skinny jeans he's wearing tight. He wiggles it like a cat about to pounce, makes a chirpy little sound that's oddly muffled, and then squawks when he reaches too far over the front of the desk and nearly falls. His arm, from what Nick can tell, is buried elbow deep in Nick's bottom drawer.

Nick frowns. "Can I help you with something?" he asks, loudly.

The kid pauses momentarily, and then, inexplicably, spreads his knees and looks at Nick upside down from between his legs. Nick has absolutely no response to that. They stare at each other wordlessly for a few seconds, and then the boy extracts his hand from Nick's stuff and sits up properly. He's sucking on a lolly, the stick poking out the side of his mouth, and he folds himself neatly right side up on the desk, crossing his legs in front of himself and looking up at Nick with open curiosity. He has messy brown hair that falls over his forehead in a sweet fringe, and bright blue eyes, an impossibly pretty face, and his plain t-shirt is bright red. He scratches the tip of his nose and then pulls the lolly—one of those gourmet ones, round and swirly-colored—out of his mouth with one hand. He's holding Nick's Magic 8 ball in the other. He's small, little hands and feet and slight-framed. He looks far too calm for anyone having been caught snooping around in someone else's desk.

"Hullo," he says, eying Nick up and down, shamelessly judgmental. "Are you Nick?"

"I am," says Nick, irritated but incredibly intrigued. "Didn't your mum ever teach you it's impolite to go through someone else's things?"

"Sure," says the kid, shrugging. "I'm Louis."

"Louis," Nick repeats.

Louis nods. "Tomlinson."

"Louis Tomlinson."

Louis frowns at him, tilting his head and looking wary. "You're not very bright then, are you?"

LMC laughs aloud at that. Louis's lips quirk upward at the corners, like he's fighting a smile.

"What are you—"

"You've got a lot of trinkets," says Louis. "I like it. Your desk is way less boring."

"Less boring than who's?" Nick asks, nonplussed. Who is this kid?

"He was digging through mine when I arrived," Matt says, sounding rather more cross than Nick. "Do you know him?"

Louis leans over to look around Nick at Matt. He looks just as unimpressed by Matt as Matt is by him. Nick feels a bit like he's fallen down the rabbit hole. And then he remembers.

"Louis," he says. "You're _Harry's_ Louis."

Louis frowns. "That's very presumptuous."

"His friend, I mean," says Nick. "You're working here now."

"Full marks," says Louis. He sticks out a hand. "Nice to meet you."

Nick takes it. Louis's hand is little and warm and dry. Nick says, "Hiya."

Louis smiles, so sweet it just lights up his face. Matt makes an annoyed sound behind him. Louis quirks an eyebrow and winds his tongue around his lolly. Nick wants to fuck him. He tilts his head, watches Louis's lips close around his lolly. It's filthy, and so forward. He presses the ball of the lolly into his cheek so Nick can see the swell of it. Nick smirks wolfishly. He's pretty sure Louis wants to fuck him too.

"You're in public," says Ian, sounding amused. "Stop looking at each other like that."

Louis opens his mouth, and Nick is very disappointed when Fiona opens the door and interrupts him. "Sorry, everyone, I had a conference call. I see you've all met Louis?"

"Absolutely," says LMC, grinning. Matt nods sharply and Nick turns around to sit on his desk next to Louis. LMC looks at Fiona. "He's awfully nosy, going through our desks."

Fiona frowns over at Louis, who gives her an angelic smile. Her expression softens into fondness at once, and then she looks Nick up and down and frowns again. "That's not entirely work appropriate, Grimmy."

Louis snickers, and Nick elbows him in the side. "I brought a change of clothes," he says, showing Fiona his dry cleaning.

"Go and change into them then."

Louis smirks over at him, shifting around where he sits so that his knee bumps into Nick's thigh. "Yeah Nick, go and change, then. You're showing an inappropriate amount of skin and it's making me uncomfortable."

"Oh my God," says Nick, halfway between delighted and repelled, "You're such a twat."

"Nick," says Fiona, warning.

"Cat, I said!" Nick says at once, grinning his most charming grin. He gestures to Louis. "Just look at him, all curled up. Positively kitten-like, isn't he?"

Louis frowns fiercely at him. Fiona clears her throat. "Right, then. Louis, if you're finished causing trouble, follow me to the file room. Nick, change your clothes. The rest of you can get to work any time you're ready."

Louis hops down and stretches, shorter than Nick even with Nick still sitting on the desk. He shakes his fringe out of his eyes and tosses Nick a little smile, shoving his lolly back into his mouth and sets Nick's Magic 8 ball on the desk

"Cheers," he says, and follows Fiona back past Nick's desk and into the filing room. Nick doesn't even pretend that he's not watching his arse as he goes. It's silent in his wake, until LMC gives a low whistle and Nick looks around at her,

"You have such a type, Grimmy," she says.

"I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about it."

Ian snorts. "Did you see his little trousers rolled up, though? He might be a bit preppy for you."

"Nick likes them preppy," says LMC. "He'd never date anyone more hipster than he is. When we were in sixth form, he was positively moon-eyed over this little blond twink who's family owned half of Oldham. Used to wear these v-neck jumpers in pastels, he did. Caught Nick getting a blowie at least twice. Thought he was going to marry him."

Nick throws his magic 8 ball at her. Ian catches it, laughing, and Nick stands up straight and scoffs at them. "There's nothing wrong with having a type."

"This one isn't rich," Finchy says, still sounding grumpy. "Just loud."

Louis sticks his head out of the file room. "I'm right here, you know. I can hear you."

Once Nick's changed into smart trousers and a blue shirt and sits behind his desk, he notices that the trey of paperclips, extra staples, and binder clips has been taken out of the small top drawer of his desk, and in its place is a bag full of big blue lollies like the one Louis was just fellating for Nick, and a small wooden box reminiscent of a jewelry case. Nick picks it up, startles a little when part of it moves under his thumb.

"What's this then?" he asks the other three, holding it up for them to see. Ian, at the desk next to his, rolls his eyes.

"We all got them," he says. "They're from Louis."

"Japanese puzzle boxes," LMC says, showing Nick her own proudly from across the room. "You have to slide the little bits about until it unlocks. Took me twenty minutes. Had a book of wash-off tattoos inside."

"Mine had a little rubber ninja," says Ian. Nick can see it sitting on top of his computer monitor. It's small and blue. He looks expectantly at Finchy, who glares, and Ian grins. "Finchy was a twat because Louis flirted with that little blond Irish guy he fancies, so Louis glued his box shut before he could figure it out."

"Hm," says Nick.

"It's an ice breaker!" Louis calls from the file room.

Nick looks at Ian. "Did he stash lollies in your drawer too?"

"Yeah."

"What color?"

"Red."

Nick pulls the bag of blue ones out and holds them out to Ian. "Let's swap, I like red better."

"You're all daft," Matt snaps.

 

 

Nick gets his puzzle box open on his lunch break. Inside is a decoder ring. He wanders into the file room where Louis is putting together information packets to be mailed out to prospective students. He's folded up neatly on the floor between two tall shelves, right in front of the Ms. The stack of completed packets is nearly as tall as he is. He looks up when Nick wanders over to him, wearing his new ring.

"You're a bit weird, kitten," Nick tells him.

Louis quirks an eyebrow up at him. "I give you the tool to solve all the mysteries of the universe and you come in here with insults? How very dare you."

Nick crouches down next to him, close enough to smell his subtle cologne. "It wasn't quite an insult."

Louis tilts his head. "You want to kiss me, don't you?"

Nick nods. "Yeah."

Louis laughs, like he didn't expect Nick to admit to it. He's the cutest thing Nick's ever seen. "All right then," he says, and leans right in.

Nick catches his lips in a soft kiss, lifts a hand to cup Louis's cheek when neither pull away. Louis's lips are soft and a bit dry and one of his dainty little hands tangles into Nick's shirt. He tilts his chin up for a better angle, and Nick suckles gently at his bottom lip. Louis makes a please little sound and opens his mouth, presses it past the seam of Nick's lips. He feels good, Louis does. Odd little duck that's wandered into Nick's life and licking into Nick's mouth.

He pulls back before it gets too heated, and Louis looks smug and pleased. He unclenches his hands from Nick's shirt and smooths his fingers over Nick's belly. Nick strokes his thumb over Louis's cheek.

"Give you a ride home after work?"

Louis pushes him back a bit and tugs at the hem of his own t-shirt, clearing his throat importantly. "Fine," he says, like he's indulging Nick in something unpleasant. Nick kisses him again, quickly.

"For luck."


End file.
